Chapter One
Dalziel
got out of bed and stretched his arms. For the first night in as long as he
could remember, he hadn’t dreamed, which was odd since Conscription Day was
almost here. The day when Ibernian boys, such as he, would be chosen to serve
in the Andal military, the occupying force in Ibernia. A horrible finality descended
on the locals when the names were shouted out, as if the magistrate were calling
out the names of the dead. Because when a boy’s name was drawn, without so much
as enough time to say goodbye to his family, he was led to the barracks by
Andal soldiers to begin his service to the Empire. And no boy ever came back.
Dal
prayed to the god of the Ibernians: "Dio, if you’re listening, please
don’t let me or Soren be picked. Neither of us is ready for a life of slavery
to these monsters." He went to his younger brother’s bedroom and shook
Soren hard until he awoke. The boy mumbled something and sat up, wiping the
sleep from his eyes. Then Dal distinctly heard his brother say where he could
put his idea of a wakeup call.
Their
mother was in the kitchen peeling potatoes and humming a simple refrain, a good
sign, as she was at least doing something instead of staring out the window in
a hopeless daze.
“Morning,
Mom," Dal said.
“Good
morning, Dalziel,” his mother replied, and as she tossed away the skins she
added, “I love you."
While
it wasn’t much, this was the most normal his mother had acted in years. Ever
since his father had died in the rebellion ten years earlier, she had been a
shell of her former self.
“Love
you too, Ma,” he answered as he gave her a big hug. She didn’t say anything
more and quit her tune, cooking breakfast in the silence to which he had become
all too accustomed.
Soren
gave Dal an impish look as they wolfed down the food their mother set in front
of them. “Fire pits?” he whispered to his brother. Dal nodded.
Everyone
knew about the fire pits that were located a couple of miles from his family's
farm. How the pits had originated was another story. Some claimed a meteor had
hit there millenniums earlier. Some said Dio had put them there to remind
people of His fiery wrath. Some proffered that Luan and the Seraphs, mythical
heroes from Ibernia’s past, had made the fire pits during their ferocious
battles with the Woads, a thousand years ago. What a bunch of superstitious old
fools.
Dal
believed that Hadrian, an old man with a fascination for legends and history,
was at the heart of the rumors. Most
adults in Quork avoided him, but Dal found Hadrian oddly endearing because he
genuinely seemed to care about him and his family. Also, he was the only person
Dal knew who was brave enough to discuss history openly. Studying the past was
strictly forbidden by the Andals, and punishment when caught was severe.
Consequently, books were rare, and owning some types of them was punishable by
death, so most Ibernians did their best to preserve their country's legacy by
way of the spoken word. Over time, how many facts had been distorted was
anybody's guess.
And
to Dal's way of thinking, the past had been painful enough. He didn’t need a constant reminder. Life was
about surviving in the present, and he didn’t want to think about what had
occurred a millennium ago. Still, Dal paid attention when the old man spoke,
because even if it was nonsense, the tales were always entertaining.
“Come
back to earth, Dal,” Soren said, always alert to his brother’s daydreaming.
“Time to go while the day’s ahead of us.”
Both boys quietly exited the house, telling their mother they were going
to do farm work, but walking west toward the pits.
When
they arrived, Dal reminded himself that the fire pits were poorly named. Locals
said that for centuries they constantly bubbled magma and shot flames, but
there wasn’t much activity lately. However, every now and again flames would
shoot up through fissures leading to the heart of the pit, and anyone
unfortunate enough to be standing nearby would be baked to a crisp by this
earthen oven. Because they didn’t understand them, going near the pits was
expressly forbidden by the Andals. Playing in the pits, therefore, was an act
of defiance. Dal liked this, especially since the Andals were about to ruin the
lives of many an Ibernian youth.
With
the Conscription a day away, Dal wanted to spend as much private time as he could with his brother in case either
or even both of their names were drawn. He found their placement in the lottery
incredibly unfair. They had grown up fatherless, with only each other to rely
on, and now there was a real possibility that one or both of them might have to
fight for the very people who had killed their father. But today was a day to
forget all of that. Soren loved the pits, so this was where Dal took him to
play.
After
a half-hour inside one of their favorite pits, Soren yelled, “Look what I
found, Dal!” and he presented his brother with a volcanic rock. Smooth and
black, it was worthless, except to Soren.
“Wow,
nice job, partner,” Dal said, smiling widely and appreciating how great it was
to have a brother like Soren, even if he wasn’t much at geology.
Soren
dropped the rock in Dal’s hand, and he
pretended to examine it closely before his head shot up and he announced, “This
is it, we’re rich! No more farming. We’ll present this to the city council.”
“Really?”
“Sure,
next week,” Dal said, praying they would still be together. If they were, by
then Soren would have forgotten all about his discovery and be on to some other
adventure. He wished he could get as excited as his brother about anything.
While Soren remained blissfully unaware of the world around him, Dal was headed
in the other direction. Soren had been too young to understand, but Dal was
well aware that he would never see his father again. He hated the Andals for
that.
Dal
gave the rock back to Soren, and as he did something caught his eye. A faint
red light, likely generated by magma deep below the surface, was flickering
through a tiny slit in a wall behind his brother.
Without
notice, Soren punched Dal in the arm and took off running, yelling, “You’re it,
slowpoke.”
“Not
for long!”
He
let his brother get a good head start, and while it was a foregone conclusion
Dal would catch Soren, the chase was the fun, for both of them. Dal watched his
brother run around a boulder, laughing
all the while. Dal sprinted but tripped over something when he came to a
section in the pit that was dark because of a natural shelf overhead. He lost his balance and stumbled sideways,
falling into a hole.
His
immediate thought was that he’d be cooked alive. But he slammed face-first into
solid ground instead. His temples were throbbing, but he was happy to be alive.
Slivers of sunlight were adequate enough that he could see the bits of gravel
marking his descent. The “path” reminded him of the mudslides he and his
brother would ride into the river every summer. This fall held no reward at the
end, however. Idiot, Dal raged to himself. Why didn’t I slow down and let my eyes adjust to the
dark?
He
could see well enough to search the tomblike chasm for Soren, should he have
fallen in also. Not spotting him in the immediate area, Dal hollered, in case
he had wandered off. All he got in the form of a reply was an echo of his own
voice.
Dal
analyzed the chute he had fallen through. The hole was the throat of a musty
fissure that had lain dormant for some time.
He was almost certain it was part of the same crag from which the red
light had appeared, but there was no sign of magma or the aftermath of the heat
created by it. He stood and brushed off the dirt and dust that clung to his
clothing. Having no choice but to breathe
in a lot of it, he coughed and wheezed violently. He waited for his head to
clear, then he took a second look around.
The
rough ground belied the smooth rock walls that had required eons to shape. Dal
ran his hands along the face of a ledge close to him and felt ridges etched
into it. He brushed away dust and spider webs with his hands, and distinct
lines began to form. He removed his shirt and used it to gently wipe the wall
until all of what had been hidden was now exposed. The markings depicted a
winged creature in flight. Is that a man?
He suddenly felt that this was ancient, hallowed ground. The local legends
about the fire pits no longer struck him as a child’s tale.
Dal
had seen enough. He shook out his shirt and put it on and yelled, “Soren, where
are you?” Not hearing a reply, he was turning toward the ledge to climb atop it
so he could pull himself out of the chasm when he saw a red glow out of the
corner of his eye and turned toward it.
Sitting
in a small hole, as if it had been placed there, was a red stone. He silently
thanked Dio, hoping his prayer was heard and acknowledged. He had listened to
stories of farmers finding precious stones and living out their days in luxury,
and now it seemed possible his family would be next in line. Moving from Quork
to a larger city might be nice. Dunkirk,
perhaps.
When
he got a better look at the stone, it was clearly not like any he had ever seen before. His initial thought was that it
was a ruby, but they didn’t glow, as far as Dal knew, so that idea was discarded. And when he reached
for it, the stone glowed brighter.
Even
stranger, as he touched it, he could feel a pulse, as if it were somehow alive.
But that was a childish thought and he was no longer a kid. He picked it up,
and even though he could easily palm it, he held it with both hands.
Nothing
happened, but he found himself not staring at the stone--but into it. And
although it was red to begin with, the gem was now rapidly taking on many
different hues, as if all the different shades of crimson were battling each
other from within and displaying the winning results. The stone begin emitting
a low thrum, which sounded like gentle chanting. The effect calmed him, and he
was mesmerized by the sound until it stopped as abruptly as it had
started. His trance broken, he looked up
from the stone. How long had he been staring at it? Soren must be worried sick
about what had happened to him.
Just
then the stone sent a pulse so strong that it doubled him over. Despite his
pain, he did not let go of the stone.
What had been a glow before was now blazing light. Brilliant reds filled the
cavern, and he felt he was amidst some form of divine fireworks display. He had
the sensation of the colors penetrating his body, which he knew was impossible,
yet the feeling was real. His head was spinning, as if he had severe vertigo,
and his stomach was queasy. Saying a prayer, he asked Dio to forgive his haste
and greed.
Then,
as quickly as it had begun, the pulsing stopped. The stone remained red in
appearance, but it no longer glowed. He stared at it for a few minutes to see
if anything more would might happen, and when it didn’t, he put it in his
pocket. He’d ask Hadrian about it, because
if anyone could tell him about what he’d found, it would be the old man.
Dal
began climbing back up the chute, and when he reached the top he was out of
breath. He stopped panting and called out to Soren, who showed up almost
immediately.
“You
lose. Oh, shoot! Dal, are you okay?”
“I’m
fine. I fell down into this hole is all.
I don’t know how you didn’t end up in it too.” Dal saw a twinkle in his
little brother’s eye. “Wait a minute, you’ve been here before with some of your
friends, and you led me this way, knowing I’d take a ride down that chute. But
did you know I’d ride down it face-first?
I could’ve killed myself”
His
brother looked at him sheepishly.
“Never
mind, look at what I found.” Dal produced the stone.
“Wow!
Let me hold it,” Soren said as he grabbed it. Dal noticed that when his brother
held the stone, the vibrant red turned to a dull reddish-gray.
“Where’d
you find it?” Soren asked.
“At
the bottom of that chasm, where I was busy cracking my head.”
“Are
you gonna keep it?”
“My
head?”
“No,
silly, the stone.”
“Of
course, but I don’t know what it is. I’m going to ask Hade.”
Soren
handed it back to Dal, and with his usual enthusiasm for anything, said, “It’s
a special stone, I know it. And it was meant for you, whatever it brings. You’re
special too.” Soren laughed and tagged his brother. “You’re it!”
“No
way,” Dal said, refusing to chase his brother and risk another one of his trick
routes. He put the stone in his pocket and they headed home, Soren doing most
of the talking on the way, because Dal kept feeling the stone’s pulsation, and
this took his thoughts a million miles away.
When
they reached home around midday, they found a small snack on the table.
“Where’d you boys run off to?” their mother asked.
“Nowhere,
Ma, we were just playing in the fields,” Soren said, adding, “Dal fell.” Dal
shot his brother a dirty look.
“What
do you mean fell? Dalziel, are you hurt? Explain this.”
“Nothin',
Mother, I fell in the fields today.”
“Try
to be more careful next time.”
“I
will.”
“Your
friend, Mr. Hadrian, stopped by today.”
“Really?
What did he want?”
“Nothing
much, just to talk. He told me what was going on in town, what people have been
saying. You know, gossip.” She smiled.
At
that moment, Dal didn’t really care what Hadrian had told her. Seeing her smile
was the best thing he’d seen in a long, long time. She had been through so much
with his father’s death and the hard times that had come with it. Not to
mention the stress of seeing him entered into the Conscription every year. Now
that Soren was eligible, she must be doubly worried. The Andals had taken her
husband, now they threatened to take one or both of the men she had left in her
life. She was a strong woman, stronger than Dal had given her credit for. So
what if she’s a shadow of her former self? She keeps on going, and that’s what
matters.
They
ate the rest of their meal in silence, but an agreeable calm . As the boys were
washing up, Dal asked Soren if he wanted to go look for Hadrian with him. Soren
was quick to comply.
“What
about Hadrian’s stories, are they real? What about the Seraphs?” Soren had
clearly been listening to the old man again.
“I
honestly don’t know,” Dal replied. “I’m sure he’ll tell you all about them if
you ask. As far as the deep magic is concerned, I believe that once there may
have been Ibernians who could use elements.”
“How,
then?”
“I
don’t know. I’ve never seen the old magic before.”
“Doesn’t
mean it’s not real.”
“Okay,
you’ve got me there.”
“What
about the Seraphs? Are they real?”
He
hesitated. “I don’t think so, buddy. I think that part got exaggerated at some
point.” Dal was no historian, but he had heard people repeat stories before.
With each telling, the story got grander, especially if there was ale involved.
And since he’d never seen the histories, he was pretty sure they wouldn’t match
up with what Hadrian or anybody else might be saying.
“I
think they’re real, and that they’ll come again,” Soren said, with his usual
zeal.
“I
sure hope so. We could use their help.”
Dal
grabbed the stone in his pocket. It might well prove to be his family’s
deliverance from Quork and the hard times that had fallen upon them. He had to
see Hadrian as soon as possible.
_________________________________________________________________
Robert L. Bacon
theperfectwrite.com
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